“Come one, come all, it's happening again.” Taylor Swift's sad lyrics invade Department of Tormented Poets in a way that will make listeners weep in the gym (or wherever) alongside the poet herself.
Swift asks 'Am I allowed to cry?' nine songs on the album. What does it say about you if you only get to track four and your eyes are already puffy?
On Department of Tormented Poets, Swift opens with a line about her stint as a “functional alcoholic,” raves about her tragic typewriter hero, and declares that her name is hers and hers alone to shame as she pleases, dammit! Beyond the melodrama, her wistful lyrics are most impressive when her pen falls on the illusions of love and the grief she's needed to write about for the past two years. Themes of escape and longing bring the hazy moments.
“This writer firmly believes that our tears become sacred in the form of ink on a page.” Swift wrote as she released Department of Tormented Poets and his sad lyrics on April 19.
The album was originally announced as a 16-song set, plus four bonus tracks on different physical versions. But two hours into its release, there was much more material to unfold. As Swift explained, “I had written so much tortured poetry over the past 2 years and wanted to share it all with you, so here is the second installment of TTPD: The Anthology. 15 additional songs. And now the story is no longer mine… it's all yours.”
It's time to grab some tissues and — if you're into it — a bottle of wine and have “one hell of a time,” as Swift's duet partner Florence Welch sings on the cathartic album track “Florida!!!” Here are 10 of the saddest lyrics from Swift's album, from the prolific singer-songwriter's 31-track full-length Section The tortured poets: The Anthology version.
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In a “Bad” Depression
The saddest verse on “Down Bad”: “I'll build you a fortress on some planet/ Where everyone can see/ How dare you think it's romantic/ Leaving me safe and isolated You don't have us/ Why, I was in love”
Swift's grief for a misunderstood, mundane love that didn't survive its time on this earth swells into a great anger as she sings “f— it” in the most depressingly pleasant way.
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The Need to Bolt on “I Hate It Here”
The saddest line in “I Hate It Here”: “I hate it here, so I'll go to secret gardens in my mind/ People need a key to get in, the only one is mine/ I read it in a book when I was a precocious child/ No middle-sized town hopes and fears the little city/ I'm there most of the time because I hate it here/ I hate it here”
Swift's sad, emotional lyrics on “I Hate It Here” should hit home for anyone who's ever felt like they don't belong. He sings of being lost in daydreams and delusions of other worlds from childhood, and the comfort her imagination brings when she is dissatisfied with her reality.
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“Chloe or Sam or Sofia or Marcus” Or…?
The saddest line in 'Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus': “So if you want to break my cold, cold heart/ Say you loved me/ And if you want to tear my world apart/ Say you'll always wonder/ 'Why do I wonder/ Will I always wonder/ Will I always wonder?'
The lyrics to it Department of Tormented Poets The tracks are simple, but full of heartfelt longing and what ifs. Swift's sad words and vocal tone have her confessing to delusions about who her muse might spend his life with, if not her. The name is not important, if it is not hers.
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Mourning “LOML”
The saddest verse on “loml”: “It was legendary/ It was instant/ It was unnecessary/ I should let it stay buried”
The transition of “love of my life” to “loss of my life” is a sad enough ending to this piano ballad, but the way Swift expresses her feelings here — where she realizes this highly romantic idea, with the highest of highs and the lowest of lows , it was necessary in the end — tugs at the heartstrings.
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“So Long, London,” A Classic Track 5
The saddest lyrics in “So Long, London”: “And I'm pissed that you let me give you all that youth for free” & “Every breath is like the rarest air/ When you're not sure if it wants to be there”
Swift's bitterness at wasting time in a long-term relationship that ultimately wasn't meant to be is evident in these wistful lyrics and the underlying rage heard in her vocals. She is known for saving the track's 5th position on an album for a song she feels particularly vulnerable.
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Leaving “Peter”
The saddest line in “Peter”: “Forgive me, Peter, please know that I tried/ To keep the days when you were mine/ But the woman sitting by the window turned out the light”
All the best intentions from “Peter” didn't matter in this heart-wrenching ballad that makes Swift abandon any hope she had for her muse. The song is apparently a return to the “Peter Losing Wendy” concept. Folklore“Jacket”. Here, Swift sings wistfully about coming to terms with an old flame's inability to ever grow up or keep promises: “The lifespan of these fantasies is over.”
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Spelling is no fun! on “How did it end?”
The saddest line in “How Did It End?”: “My favorite ghost and I/ Sitting in a tree/ DYING”
“How did it end?” has a spelling lesson, but it's a long way from “ME!” Swift swaps the childish rhyme of “Sitting in a tree/ KISSING” for a disturbingly tragic scene within the sad lyrics of a song that has no real answer to how the relationship ended.
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The Toxic “Department of Tormented Poets”
The saddest line in “The Tortured Poets Department” (the song): “At dinner, you take my ring off my middle finger/ And put it on the one where they put wedding rings/ And that's the closest I've come to my heart exploding”
The tragedy in this verse is knowing the end, which is that there was to be no marriage. The idea of Swift's sweet heart beating in such a falsely beautiful moment—a romantic gesture straight out of a romantic comedy—changes what must be happy lyrics sad. No one wants to know that the heroine's heart will be broken!
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“I Can Do It With a Broken Heart” is dark
The saddest lyrics on “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart”: “I'm so depressed, I act like it's my birthday every day” & “I'm miserable, and no one even knows!”
Swift seemed to be having the time of her life on stage at The Eras tour, despite disappointment in her personal life, but with these lyrics she reveals she covered up her gloom to keep the show going. And as the show continues, people are clamoring for more, more, more of her – a disturbing picture.
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This grief “The smallest man that ever lived.”
The saddest line in “The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived”: “And you hid in plain sight/ But you are what you did/ And I'll forget you, but I'll never forgive/ The smallest man that ever lived”
This song is full of pain from Swift, but it's the subdued outro addressed to her imagined lover that has the saddest lyrics of all. Her voice cracks as she commemorates and reduces her tormented muse to one act:You are what you made.”
from our partners at https://www.billboard.com/lists/taylor-swift-the-tortured-poets-department-sad-lyrics/
